Free Republic

Chancellor Angela Merkel and Bavarian conservative leader Horst Seehofer have reached a deal on migrant policy that could save the governing coalition.

A meeting of NATO Heads of State and Government will be held on Wednesday 11 and Thursday 12 July 2018 in Brussels, Belgium. The meeting will be chaired by the NATO Secretary General and will include a short opening ceremony.

A special meeting on the EU migration crisis could take place as early as next weekend. Meanwhile, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer has said no one is interested in "toppling the chancellor" over the issue.

A glaring rift has emerged between Angela Merkel's conservative CDU and its Bavarian CSU sister party over how to deal with asylum-seekers. The days of Germany's coalition government could be numbered.

Basic translation: If you remember the Stockholm cop who recently aired a lot of commentary about problems with law enforcement and migrates within the city...well, the cops have decided to investigate him for hacking into their computer system. Chief logic? He utilized a lot of data to back-up his facts, which the data could only have come from their own database. So they are accusing him of illegal behavior and misuse of protected police data. Story lead by SVT TV news folks.

Basic translation: The German BND (CIA) has concluded a year long review and determined that there was no Putin or Kremlin inspired/directed interference in German politics. As well, no disinformation campaign noted. The story featured last fall in Germany of a 13-year old Russian-German girl being raped by migrants? All made up by the young girl....no part of the story was factual, although widely reported in Russia, and may have had an effect on voting in Berlin-state election.

German Supreme Court basically ordered the government to find a way to bring Snowden into the court and allow him to give testimony for their special commission. The gov't had taken the position that this would end well and denied the commission request back a year ago. What happens now? Probably a couple of months to arrange this, and to expect the US to drop a extradition document onto them, and how they will deny the request. This is generally designed as a high-topic item for the election year (Sep 2016), and geared to escalate some type of anti-US situation...

Basic translation. The police bust yesterday netted bomb-making material from a site in Chemnitz, Germany. The bomb-maker is a young Syrian guy immigrated in 2015. Some screw-up occurred with the German cops, and the young Syrian got away, while they got the material and two of his associates. Nation-wide search underway for the bomb-maker. Within the last hour, state-run news has noted that there is info that this bomb episode was possibly designed for one of the two Berlin airports.

The right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) has bagged third place in municipal elections in the central state of Hesse, and the populist party is polling strongly a week ahead of three key state elections.

Unnanounced late on the 29th, the US Navy moved into the Gulf region and set up a trap. Within a few hours....an Iranian patrol boat entered the open waters and were going to "trap" the poor Americans. As the Iranian boat approached, suddenly...additional boats appeared, and as the Iranian vessel turned to leave....a large US sub suddenly lifted out of the water to block their exit. They were taken prisoner to the local US navy cruiser. The following is a letter that one of the Iranian captured personnel prepared and was translated by a US Navy contractor....hired out of Mobile...

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into the disappearance of U.S. Air Force Maj. Jill Metzger, who went missing for three days last month in Kyrgyzstan. FBI officials told FOX News that Metzger's disappearance is being investigated by the FBI, and the center of the investigation appears to be the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia in Alexandria. At the time of her disappearance, Metzer was newly married and on temporary assignment at a U.S. base in Kyrgyzstan. Metzger claims that while shopping at the TSUM department store for souvenirs before a scheduled...

The New York senate race of 2006 is almost a lost cause for the Republican party. Hillary has set the deck in her favor, and no seems to want a chance to take her on.

BERLIN (Reuters) - Germans are leaving their country in record numbers but unlike previous waves of migrants who fled 19th century poverty or 1930s Nazi terror, these modern day refugees are trying to escape a new scourge -- unemployment. Flocking to places as far away as the United States, Canada and Australia as well as Norway, the Netherlands and Austria more than 150,000 Germans packed their bags and left in 2004 -- the greatest exodus in any single year since the late 1940s. High unemployment that lingers at levels of more than 20 percent in some parts of Germany and...

A German doctor is in custody after allegedly admitting she tortured a number of children at Colonia Dignidad, a secretive religious colony in Chile. Gisela Seewald, 75, is said to have told a judge that she gave them electroshock treatment and sedatives. She was ordered to do so by the group's ex-leader, Paul Schaefer, who said they were possessed, she reportedly said. Mr Schaefer is in jail charged with child abuse and aiding secret police during the 1973-1990 military regime. A former Nazi and Baptist preacher, he established the 13,000-hectare (32,000-acre) colony in southern Chile in 1961, after fleeing Germany...

A former German hostage who spent 24 days in the hands of captors in Iraq said Monday that her kidnappers were not criminals and had demanded humanitarian aid for Sunni Arab regions. Speaking to Doha, Qatar-based satellite channel Al-Jazeera, Susanne Osthoff said her captors told her not to be afraid as her kidnapping was "politically motivated." "Do not be afraid. We do not harm women or children and you are a Muslim," she quoted them as saying. "I was so happy to know that I had not fallen into the hands of criminals," she said. Osthoff, a Muslim convert who...

Ministry to examine additives in cigarettes Officials publish list totaling 1,174 pages. The ingredients on the list look like the recipe for some sort of treat: cocoa, sugar and plum extract. But they are not some of the makings for a cake. They actually are some of the additives that cigarette makers put in their products, Germany's consumer ministry said. In an effort to inform consumers, the ministry put a list of the additives used by manufacturers on its Internet site on Tuesday. ”With the publication of the list of additives in tobacco products, we are creating transparency for the...

Germany less competitive. Germany has fallen to rank 23 from rank 21 in the ”World Competitiveness Yearbook 2005” of Lausanne's International Institute for Management Development. In 2001, the annual study still listed Germany as the world's 17th most competitive economy. This year's study cited as particular weaknesses the relatively low inflow of foreign direct investment into Germany, weak growth rates and general economic and fiscal policy parameters. The IMD's economists called for a reform of the German tax system, the consolidation of public finances, the development of a comprehensive innovation strategy, a reform of the education and social insurance systems,...

Second nuclear plant shut down. Decision devastates southern German town, encourages environmental minister To some, the occasion resembled a funeral. To others, a champagne celebration. The occasion on Wednesday was the permanent shutdown of a nuclear power plant in the southern state of Baden-Württemberg. The plant, in operation since 1969, was taken off line as part of a groundbreaking agreement to abandon nuclear energy that the national government reached in 2000. Under the plan, all 19 German nuclear power plants are to be shut down by 2020. The plant in Obrigheim was the second shut down. The shutoff was a...

Premier's re-election sabotaged: Dissenter creates the ‘darkest day' Thursday was to be a crowning moment in the career of Heide Simonis, the day on which she was to be re-elected as premier of Schleswig-Holstein. Instead, it turned into a disaster. The dramatic turn of events began when lawmakers met in Kiel to pick the person who will lead the state for the next five years. To be voted premier, Simonis needed the absolute majority of 35 votes. The slim majority seemed assured thanks to the unusual arrangement she and her Social Democratic Party forged to preserve their place in office...

Top managers resist forced disclosure of salaries Government plans to tighten corporate governance after companies ignore voluntary code Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries' initiative to force managers to disclose their salaries has met with fierce resistance from some of the biggest names of corporate Germany. The heads of Daimler Chrysler, BASF, BMW, Munich Re and Porsche said they had no intention of publishing more than a combined figure for management board remuneration. The government announced last Friday that it planned to force management board members of listed companies to disclose their individual salaries from 2006, a direct response to the fact...